1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to liquid crystal devices and electronic apparatuses.
2. Related Art
In the field of liquid crystal displays (LCDs) represented particularly by liquid crystal televisions (TVs) or the like, LCDs in the optically compensated bend (OCB) mode which have a high response speed have been in spotlights in recent years in order to improve the quality of moving images. In the OCB mode, liquid crystal in its initial state exhibits a splay alignment. In a display operation, the liquid crystal must be bent into a bow shape (bend alignment). That is, the high speed responsiveness is realized by modulating a transmission factor based on the degree of bend in the bend alignment in a display operation.
In the case of such an LCD in the OCB mode, the liquid crystal exhibits the splay alignment when power supply is cut off. Therefore, at the time the LCD is turned on, the so-called initial transition operation must be performed in which the alignment state of the liquid crystal is changed from the initial splay alignment to the bend alignment for a display operation by applying a voltage greater than or equal to a certain threshold voltage to the liquid crystal. JP-A-2001-296519 discloses the technique of promoting the initial alignment transition of liquid crystal using horizontal electric fields generated between the liquid crystal and pixel electrodes.
However, the technique described in JP-A-2001-296519 requires a high voltage in order to form transition nuclei at predetermined positions of the pixel electrodes. Therefore, a power supply of small capacity for use in an electronic apparatus such as a mobile apparatus has insufficient electric field intensities and cannot produce sufficient and equivalent transition nuclei. This results in display errors or failing to achieve desired high speed responsiveness.